Lipstick (on my collar)
by redtoes
Summary: Oliver asks Felicity to help him maintain his playboy cover, and against her better judgement, she agrees. Five times Felicity left a lipstick mark on Oliver, and one time she didn't. Response to a tumblr prompt by gretaprewett. Rated for language.
1. Pale Peach

"You want me to what?" Felicity tries hard to keep calm but the end of the sentence still comes out much higher pitched than she intended.

Oliver stares at her in that infuriating way he has. It's as if his crazy (and generally also illegal) requests are perfectly sensible, and she is the insane one for not immediately acquiescing.

"I want you to kiss me," Oliver says, "on the cheek."

He taps a finger against his face as if to indicate the spot. "Or maybe on the collar of my shirt."

Felicity blinks.

"Nope, nope," she says, shaking her head, "still doesn't make sense." She makes a show of pinching her own wrist. "Ow! But at least now I know I'm not asleep."

"Felicity," Oliver says, his frustration evident.

"I mean, I get times are tough in vigilante dating world," Felicity continues to ramble, "what with your ex shooting your most recent date, but I am not here to be a replacement lay, or good time, or whatever. I don't care how many dreams I've had that began like this, I am not a substitute for gorgeous Laurel and I won't be treated like one."

"Felicity!" Oliver says, reaching over to grasp her shoulder. There's something about the way he does it and the frustration in his voice that suggests it's not the first time he's tried to interrupt her. Mentally she replays her rant and winces. Did she really just admit to dreaming about him?

Oliver, as ever, has ignored her verbal gaffe and is standing right there, holding her shoulder and waiting for her to acknowledge him.

"It's just sexist," she says, tilting her chin up defiantly, "you wouldn't ask Digg to do this."

"No, I wouldn't," Oliver admits, "but that's because Digg doesn't wear lipstick."

Felicity blinks.

"Thea thinks I have a date tonight," Oliver admits, "and you're wearing really bright lipstick and I thought, if I got some of it on me, then Thea won't question where I was."

"Oh," Felicity says, "well that makes some sense, at least. But I don't have the tube with me."

"I know," he admits, "I checked your bag. So I need you to kiss me."

"And we're back again to this," Felicity sighs, "and don't think I didn't notice the gross invasion of privacy thing you just slipped in there. My bag is off limits."

"I didn't want to bother you," he says, apologetically. "You looked busy."

"Apology accepted," she says because that's as close as he ever gets and she'll grow out her roots waiting for the actual words.

"Now," he says, "about that kiss."

"Oh for the love of Google," Felicity says and pulls on his shoulder. Oliver obediently leans in and Felicity goes up on her toes and presses her lips to his jawline, before her brain can remind her of any of the reasons why this is a bad idea.

She pulls back and there's not a mark on him - damn that stay fast formula - so she leans in again and this time, instead of kissing, she just rubs her lips along his jaw, feeling the hard bristle of his stubble scratch at her skin, then drops down to press her pursed lips against his collar.

She pulls back and yup, sure enough, that worked. There's a light smear of pale peach color on his face and a lip-shaped smudge on his white shirt collar.

"Mission accomplished," she says, and turns away before he can see that her hands are shaking a little.

"That's brilliant Felicity," he says and she glances over her shoulder to see him admiring her handiwork in a nearby mirror. "Thank you."

"No problem," she says, feeling proud of the fact she can keep her voice steady, then she walks back to her computers and tries not to think about what just happened as she hacks her way into a secure database at SCPD.

A week later he asks again.


	2. Bright Pink

"Have you got anything sluttier?"

Felicity blinks then narrows her eyes.

"And just what," she says in a voice anyone who shared her women's studies college courses would instantly recognise, "does a lipstick have to do to be 'sluttier'?"

"I don't know," Oliver says, oblivious to her growing consternation. "Be redder, maybe? Or involve glitter?"

"And just what about wearing red glitter lipstick makes a woman slutty?"

Behind Oliver's back Diggle shakes his head, amused, either by the impending feminist rant or Oliver's obliviousness.

Felicity takes a deep breath and wonders once again how she got herself into this.

Oliver pokes through the small zipped bag of lipsticks that Felicity now keeps in the lair as if they're explosive.

"It's just," Oliver says, "all of your lipsticks seem a bit too..."

Felicity holds her breath and prepares to let her well reasoned and rehearsed rant about how wearing lipstick doesn't make you any less of a feminist when he actually shocks her into silence.

"...classy."

"Classy?"

"Classy," Oliver agrees. "Thea knows the kind of women I date, and they're not the type for taupe." He holds up a tube and squints at it.

"Have you ever thought that maybe you don't have to stick to all your old dating habits?" Felicity asks.

"Well, I wouldn't be," Oliver says, "if I was actually dating, but as the only lipstick I ever end up wearing is yours, does it really matter who the imaginary owner is?"

Felicity blinks at him, then shakes her head.

"A woman's worth is not defined by her lipstick," she says evenly, "and besides, I'm sure your sister would love to see you date someone she actually got to meet no matter what lipstick color they wear."

"Now who's judging?"

"I'm not judging," Felicity says quickly. She finds the brightest of her lipsticks and uncaps it. "Come here," she says.

Oliver leans over and Felicity reaches up to smear the color along his neck, using her index finger rather than the tube directly. The bright pink shade stands out against his skin and she flashes for a second on the last time she wore this. She was getting ready for a date and wanted an extra splash of color for confidence.

Now she's using it to decorate her vigilante boss's neck to show how he's been dating a sluttier type of woman. Man, She hates that word.

She distracts herself by picking up his discarded shirt from a nearby countertop and dabbing her lipstick on the collar.

"It never looks as good," Oliver says, examining himself in the mirror, "as when you did it the first time."

"The first time I kissed you," she says, almost absently, then pauses. "You're not saying you want me to-"

"No," Oliver interrupts, "this works, this is great."

Behind them both Diggle chuckles.

"But it doesn't look like lips," the bodyguard says, gesturing at Oliver's neck. "Just a weirdly shaped stain. I really think you might have to kiss him."

"No!" Felicity says, then starts at how loudly she said it.

Oliver stares at her.

"What?" He says, "you've kissed me before."

"And now we have lipstick," Felicity counters. She looks down at the lipstick in her hands and sees how the color stains her fingertips. Suddenly a thought occurs to her and it's such a delicious thought, such a mischievous thought, that she can't help but grin in anticipation.

"But if you need lips to leave a mark your collar," she says, "you've got a perfectly good pair of your own."

And before he can move or blink or pull any of his secret ninja moves, she rubs the lipstick left on her index finger over his lower lip.

Oliver blinks.

Diggle lets out a guffaw.

"I'm not generally one for sharing cosmetics," Diggle says, "but I do think that's your color."

Oliver's eyes shift to Diggle then slide back to Felicity, and she can see hint of something - amusement maybe, or his own brand of mischievousness - in them.

"Waste not want not," Oliver says and reaches for his shirt.

He doesn't break eye contact with her as he presses his lips to the stiffened collar, and Felicity has to clamp down on the whole body shiver that threatens to manifest.

It's just his petty revenge for her childish trick with the make-up, but for half a second she remembers the brush of his stubble under her lips from that one and only time she kissed him and she can't remember why doing it again would be a bad idea.

Then her computers beep and Diggle clears his throat and suddenly they're all in motion and the moment has passed.

She watches from the corner of her eye as Oliver wipes the remaining lipstick off his mouth with the back of his hand. And she tries to tell herself that she didn't see anything deeper in his eyes than amusement and mischievousness.

Nothing at all.


	3. Blood red

"Who taught you to shave, mister?"

Felicity dislikes Isabel Rochev. And she knows she's not the only one. Oliver practically vibrates with hatred for her and even Diggle, whose approach to anyone not Deadshot (or Carly) can be mostly described as either bland indifference or big brother like protectiveness gets a curl in his lip when Rochev approaches.

Felicity's immediate response that "it's not his blood," raises eyebrows and so she has to cover (as ever), licking her fingers and rubbing at the smear of blood along Oliver's jawline babbling about how he never learned how to use a razor properly.

The thought crosses her mind that it looks not unlike the lipstick with which she has decorated his skin in the past, but with the gleam of it, the wetness; it's so obviously not the stain of a dalliance on his way in.

Hence her elder-sister-like teasing of her vigilante boss over his shaving habits.

Anyone with half a mind could see that with the amount of stubble he's (always) sporting, there's no way this is a shaving accident. But what else could it be?

It's obviously blood.

She just hopes that Rochev, with her disdainful approach to both Oliver, as well as herself and Digg as his ever present support system, won't see through this particular ruse.

Diggle steps in close once Rochev has rolled her eyes and walked away. Oliver is working the room, the consummate host, trained from childhood to participate in business oriented small talk and remember people's names.

"You are so married."

Felicity starts.

"I had to cover," she says, turning to glare at Diggle, "what other explanation could there be for blood on his face? Oliver Queen does not get into fist fights."

"Okay, now you're doing the creepy third person thing," Diggle says, "I'm not sure it's any better coming from you."

"What are you talking about?" Felicity snaps, not in the mood to be judged by anyone right now. That's what Rochev has been doing for the past hour while she covered for Oliver and that's all the judgement she can take today.

"You know everyone thinks you're sleeping with him, right?"

"Yes," she sighs, "I've heard the gossip. From a particularly dumb intern in accounts who didn't know who I was but was oh so keen to enlighten me on why the CEO's new EA is vastly under qualified. The consensus is my skirts are too short. Apparently."

"Ah," Diggle says.

"'Ah,' what?" Felicity snaps.

"I should have known," Diggle says, "you heard this what, a week ago?"

"Eight days."

"The timing fits," he says, "good on you Smoak. And as a male friend with no designs on your virtue and incredible respect for your skills who gets to enjoy the view, I also thank you."

"I don't know what you're taking about?" She says, but she does, and if anyone was ever going to see through her, it would be the eerily prescient John Diggle.

"You heard your skirts were too short eight days ago," he says, "and all your skirts since then have been even shorter. Dangerously so. It's your own personal 'fuck you' to the office gossip."

"I don't know what you're talking about," she sniffs. "A modern woman can wear whatever length skirt she wants, and if the accounts team's systems have managed to crash every single day for the past, oh, eight days, I don't know anything about that either."

"He doesn't deserve you, Felicity," Diggle says.

"Oh, I know that," she says, "but if keeping his secret is going to destroy my professional reputation, I might as well have some fun with it."

Diggle smiles at her, but it's a sad smile.

"He has no idea, does he?"

"Oliver I-notice-nothing-unless-it-threatens-the-city-or-is-called-Laurel-Lance Queen? Of course not."

"Too good for him," Diggle says, and his hand comes up to squeeze her shoulder.

Felicity looks pasts Diggle to where Oliver is talking to his sister and two of the board members from Walter's bank.

"Dammit," she swears.

"What?"

"I missed a bit," she says, "look."

And sure enough, right there under Oliver's ear is a smear of blood. It was out of sight when she cleaned the stain off his jaw, but from this distance the red stands out against his skin.

"It looks like lipstick," Diggle says, "leave it."

"This party is for investors," she says, "who is going to want to invest in a company whose CEO is stained with either blood or lipstick? Neither are very professional."

"If you draw attention to it," Diggle warns, "it might make it worse."

Felicity sees the exact moment that Thea notices the stain. A slight smile pulls at her lips and she lifts her glass to her lips as if trying to cover it.

Oliver, with his ninja like awareness of the people around him, immediately picks up on his sister's amusement.

He says something, but he's too far away for her to hear it. Thea's response is a raised eyebrow and some sort of comment that has Oliver raising his hand to the skin underneath his ear and glancing across to where Felicity and Diggle stand.

Felicity hopes that his answer was innocent, but Thea follows his gaze and she can feel the teenager's eyes lock onto her. She doesn't need to be within earshot to know that the next thing Thea says to her brother is about who left that "lipstick" mark on his neck.

Oliver obfuscates, obviously, hands open, eyes wide, but he also has a handkerchief pressed to his neck, cleaning away the evidence.

But as ever, he can't quite do it himself.

Felicity is in motion before she really thinks about it, reaching him in seconds and taking the material from his hand. It takes her two swipes to clear the ichor from his skin, but that's more than enough time for the Queen siblings to have a conversation using only facial expressions.

"And done!" She says, cheerfully handing the handkerchief back to him.

In doing so she meets Thea's eyes.

"It's so nice to meet you," Oliver's sister says and suddenly Felicity is shaking hands, "I don't know anyone Ollie... works with."

"I'm just his assistant," Felicity says before she can think.

"Right," Thea says in the sort of tone that it's just not worth trying to disagree with. Nothing Felicity says will make a difference. Thea's mind is made up.

"I'm gonna...go," Felicity says and beats a hasty retreat.

"I see why you've been having all those late nights at the office, Ollie," Thea says just before Felicity is completely out of earshot and she suppresses a flinch as she walks.

It's okay, it's fine, there are bigger things at stake than what Thea Queen thinks of her.

But it hurts all the same.

She doesn't hear Oliver's response, doesn't hear him deny and decry. Tell Thea off for her assumptions. She doesn't hear any of it.

Diggle has a drink waiting for her when she returns. A drink and a sympathetic look.

"You're too good for him," he says, again.

"Don't I know it," she replies, but it's not the truth. She'd sacrifice a lot to keep Oliver safe. On the streets and in the boardroom both.

What value is her reputation when weighed against all the good he can do?

Nothing. Nothing at all.


	4. Burgundy

This shouldn't be happening. She's not in some sort of eighties spy hijinx movie - there are no easily-outwitted comedy henchman with thick accents and tiny moustaches here. This danger is real and ever-present and there is no way Oliver can possibly think _this_ will work.

Except it does.

She can't see the guard because the bulk of his body is between her and the door, pressing her into the wall, but the very masculine chuckle she hears sounds straight out the movie Hollywood would make of her life.

Oliver pulls back from her, his hand dropping her leg from where he has it hooked over his hip.

"Ah," he says in his playboy voice, "we were just looking for a little privacy, fellas."

Felicity presses her face further into his shoulder, because _this is not happening_. Oliver Queen did not just press her up against a wall, slide his hand down her body to the high cut slit in her dress and wrench her leg out and up over his hip so they were pressed, body-to-body against the wood paneling that hides the safe whose electronic lock she'd just hacked mere seconds before.

He hadn't kissed her, he obviously knew enough not to push her that far, but as he steps back her body feels suddenly cold without the warmth and bulk of him against her. It may have only lasted a second, but she knows that second replayed will become minutes, hours even, in her dreams.

As he turns, she makes a show of smoothing down her dress and hiding her face from the guards. They might think it embarrassment, shyness maybe, missing the truth that she doesn't want to be known as another of Oliver's women, no matter what her reputation is in the office.

"This is a private office, Mr Queen," another guard says in a warning tone. "You can't be in here."

"You couldn't give me just ten minutes," Oliver says, his tone sleazily suggestive.

"Not in here, Mr Queen," the first guard says, "but you could buy that time somewhere just down the hall. For the right price. Say

fifty?"

"A man after my own heart," Oliver sleazes, producing his wallet. "Here's fifty for you, and another fifty if you can make sure we're not disturbed."

The guard pockets the money, and leads them out, ignoring the scowl of his apparently much less bribable colleague.

Oliver tucks Felicity under his arm and walks them down the hall. She keeps her face turned into his neck, letting him lead her, but she does poke him sharply under his jacket when his hand gropes at her chest.

"Here you go, Mr Queen," the guard says and suddenly Felicity is in some sort of den/library, with leather sofa and bookshelves.

"This will do nicely," Oliver says as he closes the door. Felicity has enough presence of mind to let out a girly giggle just before the lock clicks into place, but the second they're out of ear shot she steps back, putting some distance between them for the sake of her own sanity.

"What was that?" She asks, trying as hard as she can to keep her voice steady.

"It worked," Oliver shrugs, "Dig?"

"I see you went with a classic," Diggle says over the earpieces they're both wearing. "Have to say man, I'm surprised it worked."

"You're not the only one," Felicity mutters darkly.

"We wait fifteen minutes," Oliver says, "then we make our way back to the party. No one will be surprised to see Oliver Queen come back after a lengthy absence with a blonde."

Felicity allows herself a moment to fantasise about emptying his trust fund in favour of the Starling City Donkey Sanctuary. One day she'll do it, but only after he has completely destroyed her reputation.

"You okay with that, Felicity?" She hears Diggle ask.

"Why wouldn't she be?" Oliver says, sounding honestly perplexed.

"I'm fine," she says, even though she's not. There was more than one paparazzi on the red carpet route in to this godforsaken party and she's sure their accommodating friend the guard will tip off at least one of the gossip sites for that extra $250 they all pay. It won't take much journalistic nous for someone to put two and two together. This will be watercooler gossip for at least a week, maybe even 10 days.

"I'm fine," she repeats, because maybe if she says it enough it will magically become true. Felicity Smoak, star of QCIT, is now Felicity Smoak, sleeping with the boss. Reputation is such a fickle thing, and she had no idea how much hers meant to her until it became a noose around her neck.

"We need to look the part," Oliver is saying when she tunes back in. "I can open a few buttons, take off my tie."

"Great," she says.

"Can you do something with your hair?" He asks, and she obediently turns to a mirror and pulls a few grips loose so curls tumble down.

Her reflection already has smeared lipstick, and with her hair falling out of the elegant up-do she looks exactly like someone who's just been ravished against a wall.

Shame that nothing is farther from the truth.

"What about lipstick?" Oliver says, stepping up behind her so she can see his reflection in the mirror too.

"You've already got some on your neck," she says, "from before."

"There should be more," he says, and suddenly anger she didn't even know she felt rages up in her and it's all she can do not to turn and slap him.

She curls her hands into fist and breathes deeply.

"No," she says, keeping her voice as level as she can, "no more. I've done everything you asked for and you get to fly high as the billionaire playboy while everyone in Starling City thinks I got my job on my knees. On my _knees_, Oliver. No more."

He's staring at her. She can't read the expression but it doesn't look the least bit apologetic.

"Felicity-" he says but she cuts him off.

"No," she says, "we convinced the guard already, we can go."

"It's only been five minutes," Oliver says.

"Well then the gossip sites can print something about you being quick on your feet rather than me being good on my knees," she snaps, then wrenches open the door and walks out.

Two steps into the corridor she feels the anger leak out of her as the instincts for deception and playacting Oliver and Diggle have trained in take over, and her gait shifts to tottering, like any one of half a dozen women here tonight in too high heels.

"You go, girl," Diggle says in her ear, and it's enough to make her smile.

She risks a glance over her shoulder and sees Oliver standing in the doorway, a few buttons of his shirt undone and his tie gone. Even from this distance she can see the smear of dark burgundy lipstick on his collar.

But this time she won't be the one cleaning it off.


	5. Orange

Her alarm goes off at 5.51 every morning. It's set to 5.51 so that she can always hit the snooze button once and take those 9 minutes of half-awake quiet morning time for herself. Her alarm used to go off, pre-Oliver at seven, and that was more than enough time to shower, dress, eat and be at her desk by half eight. Now she has other responsibilities.

She hits the snooze button and immediately retrieves her tablet from its charger and checks the status of the automated programmes she runs every night - criminal activity, police reports, Google alerts. If there's anything new on ARGUS or Deadshot she forwards it to Diggle. Updates on stock prices and financial trends go in her work inbox. Any social media mentions of the Arrow are to be reviewed - anything damaging she deletes.

She's got it down to an art now - it barely takes her any time at all.

It's only when she's triaging the day's meetings - Oliver needs to have lunch with Walter but the HR director can wait until tomorrow - that it occurs to her that she sort of quit last night.

She walked away from Oliver during a mission. She finally said all the things she's been burning to say ever since that idiot intern shared the latest office gossip. And it felt good.

Walking away, leaving him speechless behind her. That felt _really_ good.

But now she has a choice to make.

She can go on with her day, organising Oliver's life and enabling his work, or she can... not. She can just stop. Do something else. Leave Oliver Queen and his crazy crusade and the damage he has done to her reputation behind her.

The concept catches her off guard and for a second she just stands there in the middle of her apartment, mouth open.

She can do whatever she wants.

She's at her desk by 8.15.

When Oliver arrives at 9 she acts as if she didn't spend the previous evening yelling at him.

"Good morning, Mr Queen."

"Felicity?"

"You have a conference call with the Chicago subsidiary at 9.30 and Mr Brock from R&amp;D wants five minutes before then."

"Thanks," he replies, and turns to walk towards his office, obvious expecting her to follow as she always does. She doesn't follow. After a few paces he stops, turns and looks at her.

"Aren't you coming?"

"Why?" She says, and returns her attention to the screen. Yes, it's childish, this passive aggressive pretend everything is fine attitude. But she's not backing down from it now. He should be happy she came in.

Beyond Oliver, by the glass door, Diggle stands poker-faced.

Oliver glances back to him, but Diggle gives him nothing.

"Felicity," Oliver says, crossing back to her desk and lowering his voice, "if this is about last night, I'm not mad."

Felicity blinks.

"You're...not mad?" She says slowly.

"No, of course not," he says, "I mean we were in the middle of a mission and I pushed you too far and you left, but it was fine, we didn't blow our cover, we got into the safe. Everything worked out."

Felicity looks at him. Oliver Queen is leaning towards her, a painfully earnest expression on his face. He doesn't get it. Despite everything she said last night, he still doesn't get it.

"Oliver," she says slowly, "do you remember what I said last night?"

"You said," he says evenly and without any hesitation, "that people think you got your job as my EA because we're sleeping together. And they're wrong."

"Yes," she replies, "I know that."

"You never struck me as someone who cared what other people thought," Oliver says.

"I don't care what other people think," she says, even though hearing the reports of her presumed skills had left her sick to her stomach, "I care about what you think. And you don't care."

"Why would I care?" He asks, seeming genuinely perplexed.

"Because it means you don't care about me," she replies. "I keep giving you one more chance to prove otherwise and you never do."

"Felicity-"

"I have worked with you now for over a year," she says. "I gave up my social life, I gave up my career, I gave up my reputation for you, and you don't care. You don't even see it. All you see is fingers that type and lipstick you can use to throw people off the scent. But I'm more than that and I'm giving up my entire life for you and you don't see it."

"Felicity-"

"No, Oliver, no," she snaps.

He stares at her, and she realises he has nothing to say. She doesn't really know what she would want him to say - should he apologise, should he acknowledge her difficulties? She doesn't know.

He's right about one thing - she always tried hard not to care about what other people think. But this horrible situation has only arisen _because_ of what people think.

She feels lost in it.

She can't do this anymore.

Oliver is watching her, warily. She's not surprised really. Two meltdowns in two days. Two in less than 24 hours if she's being accurate. Of course he's wary.

A calm settles over her and she knows what she has to do.

She picks up her handbag, gathers her phone and tablet. She slips her jacket on and steps around the desk.

"I'm sorry, Oliver," she says, and goes up on her toes to press one last kiss to his cheek.

Pulling back she can see one last impression of lips on his skin. The neutral light orange-red stands out against his skin.

She doesn't say goodbye. She knows he doesn't want to hear it.

And with a sad smile for Diggle, she walks out of Oliver Queen's life.


	6. Nothing at all

Diggle keeps in touch with her her by text and occasionally she proxies in on one of the lair's computers to help him out with a particularly tricky search or persistent bug.

What? It's her system, of course she can get into it remotely.

Oliver doesn't call.

He doesn't write.

There's a gossip site piece published the day after she left about him slamming the glass door of his office so hard it cracks (which she really didn't think was possible) and she debates long and hard about whether to nix it, but in the end decides not to. He's made his bed, he can lie in it.

A week goes by.

Then a second.

Felicity take a short term developer contract just to have something to do. Her job as Oliver's EA may have been unwelcome but the pay packet was enough to build up quite a lump sum in her bank account. She doesn't need to work but there's only so many days a girl can mainline Netflix and catch up on all the social media channels she hasn't had time to read for a year. She's even bored of cute animal gifs.

She thinks she'll be glad to get back to code, but even the trickiest of problems don't hold her attention the way they used to.

Solving this e-commerce bug or smoothing out the redundant functions in a website just aren't as exciting as hacking Interpol or breaking through the online defences of the enemy du jour.

But she is determined that she won't call him first.

She signs up to , goes on a date with an accountant who bores her, then a date with a self proclaimed "adventurer" venture capitalist who talks for ages about what a rush sky diving is.

Felicity remembers falling through the sky over Lian Yu, strapped tight against Diggle, not knowing if they would find Oliver alive or dead and realises the man has no idea what he's talking about.

She destroys the credit rating of a creep who sent her dick pix, and spends a few evenings waging a quiet personal online war against some extremist MRAs, but it's all easy pickings.

It's not what she wants to be doing.

When Diggle calls or texts her heart beats faster.

She tells herself it's just the work, just the purpose but every time they talk there's a gap in the conversation where a third voice should be.

Neither of them comment on it.

Of course her life could never be entirely devoid of Oliver Queen. Suddenly he seems to be everywhere - in the paper talking about how QC will recover from Isabel Rochev and the events everyone now refers to as the Masked Riots. He's on news shows talking about the collaboration QC R&amp;D have with Star Labs. He's on the red carpet on E! with a different model or actress on his arm each time.

And sometimes she sees the silhouette of a hooded man on the top of buildings, watching as she walks home from the deli with dinner or on the roof of the office building opposite her apartment.

She tells herself it's her imagination, but Oliver and Diggle trained her to rely on her instincts too much.

She knows it's him.

She goes on one date with Ray, then a second. He's sweet and uncomplicated, and he has a mind that can just about keep up with her. They talk microbiology and nanotech. He buys her an ice cream and doesn't laugh when she geeks out over Game of Thrones for so long it melts.

She kisses him on the stoop of her building, and as he walks back to his car she sees movement across the street.

For the first time in weeks she meets Oliver Queen's eyes and this time he's the one who looks away first.

She waves Ray off and when she raises her eyes to Oliver he's already gone.

Instead he's waiting for her inside.

When she thinks about it, she realises she's entirely unsurprised.

Of course Oliver would come to her the second he saw her kiss another man.

This is their pattern.

"He's trying to take my company."

Felicity blinks.

"Okay," she says, she can't pretend that she's unaware of Ray's interest in QC, but it hasn't really come up in conversation. "And that's what promoted this bit of B&amp;E?"

"Nothing's broken," Oliver says.

"You don't have a key."

"I picked the lock. You need a better one."

"I'll take that under advisement," she says, fully intending to ask Diggle's advice on the matter. She takes off her jacket and hangs it over the back of a chair.

"He's taking my company, Felicity," Oliver says.

She glances across to see he hasn't moved from how she first saw him. He hasn't even put his hood down. His bow is in his hand. Ready for a fight.

"Technically," she says, "QC isn't your company right now. The bank has the majority share."

"It's my company," Oliver says, "it's got my name on it."

"Well, that's mature," Felicity says. She toes off her heels and immediately drops three inches in height. "Your name's also on a wing of the public library and one of the halls at SCU. Are you going to claim those too?"

Part of her brain is amazed how calm she's being. She standing here in her apartment with Oliver Queen and she's not angry, not yelling. Instead she's pointing out his idiocy in what she considers to be a very level voice.

"They're not mine," Oliver says, interrupting her train of thought, "QC is mine, I fought for it. I don't like people taking my things. I don't like... him taking my things."

Felicity stops and looks at him. She keeps her voice as neutral as she can.

"Things plural?"

"Things plural. Things that are mine," Oliver says, and then he's suddenly standing in front of her. It's like she blinked and he appeared. She never saw the movement.

"Are you really referring," she says, "to me as a thing?"

"No," he says, "yes. No."

He clenches his fists, her eye catches the movement, pulling her gaze down. He lifts one hand and she watches as it moves towards her face.

His fingertips hover millimetres from her skin. She fancies she can feel the heat of his touch across the distance.

"I'm saying," he says in a voice that's not quite Arrow and not quite Oliver, "that I thought you were mine. I wanted you to be mine. I needed you to be mine. And when there were all those rumours, those things people thought, I didn't see how they would make you feel because all I saw was that everyone else knew you were mine. And that was what I wanted."

Felicity's mouth is suddenly dry. She licks her lips, then realises that she just licked her lips and wonders what Oliver will think that means.

Then her mind throws his words back at her.

Mine.

Want.

Need.

She looks up and there are his eyes under the hood, beneath the mask.

His hand closes the distance to her cheek and she feels the happy familiar sensation of his fingers on her face.

It feels right.

"Felicity-"

"Oliver," she interrupts, "that's a lot to take in."

"Felicity-"

"I'm going to need to think about it," she says, but she doesn't move away. Instead she feels herself tip her head, so his hand is cradling her face.

"Felicity," he says, leaning in, "be mine. Please."

"Oliver, you can't just do this, just turn up on my doorstep when I'm trying to move on, and say all these things."

But even as she says it, her face is tipping up, her lips moving closer to his.

"I was an idiot," he says, "but I was your idiot. I'm sorry."

"Oliver-" she says, intending to say more, to argue, to agree, to have it all out in words, but his hand is on her face and his lips are against her and she can't remember all the things she wanted to say because suddenly she's getting everything she ever wanted.

And it's wonderful.

His kiss warms her down to her bones and she relaxes into it and his other hand comes up on the small of her back and he's pulling her into him, and she makes this small sound of happiness and suddenly the kiss turns passionate, his tongue duelling with hers, her arms around his neck and both of his hand are on her waist and he lifts her.

Felicity's eyes fly open and she pulls back.

They're standing in the middle of her apartment. She has her legs around his waist and they're both breathing heavily.

"At some point," she says, "we're going to talk about how you only said this to me after I met and kissed another man."

Oliver glances away.

"I'm sorry."

"Apology accepted," she says, "And I'm not coming back to work for you at QC."

His face falls.

"I understand."

"But I will come back to work with you at Verdant."

He blinks and she can see the beginning of a some sort of expression. She can't tell yet what it is.

"I can accept those terms," he says, "on one condition."

"Let's hear it," she says, trying for a professional tone even though her legs are wrapped around his waist.

"Felicity Smoak," he says, very seriously, "would you please have dinner with me? Date me? And then, maybe, agree to be mine?"

"Yes, Oliver," she says, with a smile, "you know I'll always be your girl."

He grins and his entire face lifts and she can see the man he once was, the carefree boy before the years on Lian Yu. The juvenile delinquent instead of the tortured vigilante.

This time there's no lipstick stain on his skin, no mark of their kiss to show the world.

She likes this better.

All the important evidence is there in the way he looks at her, the way he touches her, the way he kisses her.

They don't need lipstick marks to show that.

Just to prove that to herself, she kisses him again.


End file.
